


eyes, lips, and hands to miss

by Muccamukk



Category: Band of Brothers
Genre: Aldbourne, Angsty Fucking, Blindfolds, Body Worship, Canon Era, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Episode: s01e03 Carentan, Established Relationship, Light Bondage, M/M, Needy Dick Winters, Plot What Plot/Porn Without Plot, Porn with Feelings, improvised bondage
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-11
Updated: 2018-08-11
Packaged: 2019-06-25 16:30:22
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,049
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15644595
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Muccamukk/pseuds/Muccamukk
Summary: Back in England following the Normandy campaign, Lew needs to reconnect with Dick.





	eyes, lips, and hands to miss

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the h/c bingo square touch starved. Title is from John Donne's "A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning."
> 
> As per the tags, it contains light bondage, blindfolds and some dirty talk.
> 
> It's more or less set in the same continuity as [Parade Rest](https://archiveofourown.org/works/15485313), but you don't need to read that to read this.

Lew gave Dick six days after they got back from Normandy before he showed up at his doorstep and employed sad puppy-dog eyes to entice him to come over to Lew's billet. He was lonely, he said. The bachelor he was billeting with had gone to London for a few days. He had the house all to himself.

He'd figured that last one would be the biggest draw, but it looked like playing poor me was the kick in the pants Dick needed to pry him out of the loving arms of his surrogate parents. Lew should have felt guilty. He didn't. Dick already felt guilty enough for the whole goddamn battalion.

"Look, Nix," Dick was saying before the door had finished clicking shut, "I can't stay long. We've got a field exercise in the morning, and I need to go over rosters with... Lipton, I guess. Keep forgetting Diel's been promoted."

"For Christ's sake, Dick," Lew grumbled. He shrugged out of his jacket and started loosening his tie. If he didn't have Dick for long, he was going to make the most of it. He'd been dreaming of this for over a month, since they'd transferred to Uppottery before the big jump. "We haven't been back for a week. You've got them on exercises already?"

Dick shook his head slightly, but didn't try to justify himself to Lew. He was lingering by the door, and Lew could tell that what he really wanted to be doing was reading infantry manuals and working out how to give his men hell. It would be for their own good of course, and more justly distributed than Sobel's flavour, but hell nonetheless.

Lew sighed. "Time for a quickie, then?"

That at least got a gleam of interest out of Dick. They hadn't been able to do much in Normandy; even when they hadn't both been exhausted to the bone, there hadn't been privacy for more than a few mutual hand jobs and the odd sloppy kiss. Lew's hands ached to touch Dick again slowly, like he had before, and he'd been hoping that Dick felt the same way. (And okay, maybe a small part of Lew was afraid that actually going to war had changed Dick, or had changed Lew, or that something between them had altered, and he couldn't have the best thing he'd ever found anymore.) So it was a relief when Dick nodded slowly and said, "Sure," and then stepped in to kiss Lew.

The way Dick kissed him hadn't changed at least. His hand still cupped the side of Lew's jaw, and his lips were still sure and demanding. Dick kissed like he'd read the manual on it, and he wanted to get it exactly right. He started lightly, just a press of the seam of his lips over Lew's bottom lip, a statement of intent until Lew opened his mouth. Then he moved on to being a total fucking tease, kissing the corner of his mouth and then pulling away before Lew could kiss back. Sometimes it felt like he was testing Lew's commitment; right now, Lew thought it was more that he was remembering what it was to have time and space to kiss a man properly.

Lew kept his lips parted and his hands on Dick's hips, remembering himself what it was like to be kissed, and remembering too all the moments in Normandy when he would have killed to have ten minutes alone with Dick. Of course, kill was the one thing he hadn't actually done there, at least not directly, but Dick had. Dick had fired shots that had killed German soldiers, and had ordered men into the line of fire and screamed at them when they wouldn't go. Dick had turned into War Incarnate and led his men into blood and battle and fire, and then led them back out again. Rather, he had led a little over half of them out, the rest had remained behind. _Heroes,_ the press called them,but that wasn't the word either he or Dick thought of. Lew was pretty sure if Dick Winters died and they cut him open, they'd find the whole damn casualty list carved in tiny letters across the surface of his heart. 

Now he was kissing Lew slow and tender, like none of it had happened. His mouth careful, and when he touched Lew's lip with his tongue, he seemed surprised when Lew opened his mouth and then kissed Dick back, as if they hadn't done this a hundred times before. As if Dick didn't kiss him like that every time. Lew tilted his head, and let Dick mesh their mouths together, and let push his tongue inside. Dick traced the inside of Lew's teeth, and again moaned in pleased surprise when Lew touched Dick's tongue with his own. All the while he held Lew's face steady with one hand on his jaw, and the other light on his upper arm. They felt almost posed, like a picture of how a couple should kiss. Lew loved it.

If all Dick wanted to do was stand here and kiss, that would have been fine with Lew, but he could almost feel Dick's mind drifting away to all the things he needed to do before the next day. He had check lists, and inventories, and rosters, and a half a company of new faces because only one half of the men they'd trained with for two years had survived in good enough shape to fight again. No one in the 101st from General Taylor down knew when they'd fight again.

Dick would pull away if Lew let him, and Lew didn't know if he let this new Dick Winters do that if he'd come back again. He'd poured his heart and soul into Easy when he'd been its XO. Now that he was its commander, Lew sometimes wondered if there was any room for a lover in Dick's life. Or indeed if Dick planned to have a life at all.

"Come on," he said. He pulled away from Dick and led him by the hand up the narrow stairs to his loft bedroom. They'd shared that loft dozens of times before Normandy, when Lew's host had been away. It hadn't changed since, but Dick still paused at the top of the stairs and looked it over—like he was assessing it for potential—before he stepped into the room proper. Lew pretended he didn't see, but stripped out of his shirt and tie as he crossed to pull the blinds down. By the time he turned around, Dick had his jacket off and was shrugging out of his suspenders. It was a new uniform. They'd all been issued new uniforms as soon as they'd gotten back to England. Lew wondered cynically if that was to put a good face on for the British as much as for the sake of their own men.

"What did you have in mind?" Dick asked. He was working his shirt buttons open and watching Lew with interest. Some part of him wanted this as badly as Lew did, even if the majority of his head was stuck in the logistics of how to keep more of his men alive next time, as if he had some control over that.

Lew looked Dick up and down, considering. He'd been thinking a quick fuck, preferably with Dick doing the fucking, but now that he'd gotten his hands on him again, he didn't want to let go that easily. "Do you want to try something new?" he asked.

Dick's mouth twisted down and sideways in a lopsided grimace. He barely wanted to be there at all. "I don't know, Lew..."

"You'll like it, I promise," Lew said. He stepped in until their chests touched and tugged Dick's shirt free of his pants, and then ran his fingers around the top of his belt line to his spine up beneath his undershirt. Dick was just enough taller to make gazing up at him through his eyelashes and silently pleading look unaffected. He planted a kiss on the edge of Dick's jaw, and felt him chuckle, a rumble in his chest and a puff of breath against his cheek.

"All right, all right," he said, and his voice was so full of affection that Lew hugged Dick just for the hell of it, trying to soak up as much of that warmth as he could. Dick's arms circled his shoulders and pulled him into a crushing embrace, pulling him so tight that Lew felt his back pop and had to struggle to breathe. Dick kissed Lew's hair behind his ear and whispered, "Missed you, Nix."

Lew had done his best to stay at Dick's side every mile of the way, from bringing him those tanks up from Utah Beach to sharing an LST from Utah Beach to Southampton, but he knew what Dick meant. It seemed as though they could let their guard down here in England, and maybe try to be themselves again, whoever they were now, after all that.

"I know," Lew said. He kissed the side of Dick's neck fiercely and then pulled his undershirt off as he stopped away. "Missed seeing you naked, especially," he added, grinning and running his hands over Dick's chest. He was all lean muscles and angles, but that hadn't changed since last time they'd had time to touch. Lew had always loved the look of red hair and pale skin, and now Dick was even more freckled from days spent in the sun, his hands and the back of his neck dark against his chest and arms. A farmer's tan, or a soldier's.

"So what are we doing?" Dick asked. He was smiling at Lew, and had maybe relaxed a little since he'd come in, though Lew could feel the knots in his shoulders when he looped his arms around Dick's neck.

"It's a game," Lew said. "I made it up just for you."

"Oh yeah?" Dick sounded interested. They hadn't played a lot of bedroom games, hadn't had time or safety for them. "What's it called?"

They had just the thickness of Lew's undershirt between them now, as their chests pressed together. Dick was warm and alive against him, and Lew could feel his heartbeat. "Name's still with committee," he said, "but my working title is 'Captain Richard Winters Takes a Goddamn Break."

Dick laughed. "I don't think it scans, but I'd like to hear more about it." Maybe Lew was projecting, but he could almost hear, _how long is it going to take?_ implied in there somewhere. That one he knew the answer to, anyway: as long as it took for Dick to fucking relax.

"It starts with you on the bed, naked," Lew told him. He stepped back enough to pull off his undershirt, and then bent to work on his boots. Dick did the same, and was too busy fussing with putting his uniform in order to watch Lew loop his belt around the top of the bed frame and buckle it to itself. He did notice when Lew rummaged through Dick's jacket until he came up with his silk escape map tucked away in an inner pocket. "I don't know why you carry this everywhere," Lew said, in reply to Dick's raised eyebrow. "It's not like you can use it to find your way around England."

"Habit, I guess," Dick said, looking a little embarrassed. They both knew that the metaphorical implications of carrying a plan for how to get away next to his skin at all times were painfully on the nose. Lew let them pass by. They were both naked, and he had a piece of silk, he didn't need to prod at Dick's insecurities.

"Go lie down," he said. He pushed at Dick's chest until he was lying on his back along the middle of the bed, and the he straddled Dick's waist. Dick was indulging him, for now, and didn't resist when Lew looped the silk around his wrists and then tied that to the belt attached to the bed frame, binding his hands over his head. "Okay?" he asked.

Dick tugged at the bonds, and found they held, then made an equivocal face at Lew, but he didn't say _no_.

"Great," Lew said, and leaned over to his bedside table. He had lube, condoms, and his own map in the drawer. He pulled out the map first and folded it into a thick band then used that to blindfold Dick. "Still okay?" The carefulness was new, as well, or rather it had returned since their first few times at Benning, when they were still so tentative around each other that Lew had wanted to cry. It had been a long time since Lew had worried that he could hurt Dick, or scare him off.

"Okay," Dick said, and Lew relaxed and went to the next part.

Lew leaned back, taking in the image of Dick lying naked under him, his arms flexing as he tugged lightly at the bonds again. His hair was bright against the faded browns and greens of the escape map, and Lew reached down and ran his fingers though it, dislodging the carefully combed lines. How many times over the last months had he wanted to either smooth or disarrange Dick's hair, but hadn't been able to? Lew was starting to develop a fixation. Well, he could do what he liked now. He scratched Dick's scalp with his nails, and Dick leaned into the touch.

"Jesus, look at you," Lew said and then watched the colour rise in Dick's cheeks at the praise. His self-consciousness hadn't changed, either. "I could sit here all night."

"You'd better not!" Dick snapped, and rolled his hips to lift up against Lew. Neither of them were fully hard yet, but with Dick's thighs rising against Lew's and Dick naked and gorgeous under him, Lew was getting there.

"All right, all right," Lew said amiably. He leaned down and kissed the palms of Dick's hands where they lay bound together, spread like butterfly wings. Dick's fingers traced Lew's cheek as he did, and he leaned up and kissed Lew's chest, laughing as Lew's dog tags bounced off his nose. His breath tickle Lew's chest hair. Dick was trying to find a nipple to suck it, but wasn't coming close. He kept planting wet kisses across Lew's chest, trying to work out where to go by feel. Lew pretended to ignore him, and kept studying Dick's hands. They were the same hands: calloused and rough from years training in the field. He had a nick along his left thumb from where his knife had slipped, but that was from Toccoa, and Lew knew it well. He sucked Dick's thumb into his mouth and ran the tip of his tongue along the thin scar. Since he was started, it only seemed fair to suck on Dick's pointing finger next, pulling it deep into his mouth and resting his teeth lightly at the base while his tongue worked back and forth across it. He sucked and hummed, and Dick made a pained noise under him and flexed his hips again. His cock was getting hard and brushed against Lew's stomach. "Mmm?" Lew asked, and Dick just laughed and set his teeth around Lew's nipple.

Like hell he was going to speed Lew up, well, fine he did take Dick's index and ring finger into his mouth together, and played his tongue along the joint between the pad of his hand and start of his finger, where a wedding ring would go. Dick's mouth was spread wide over his skin, and he circled Lew's nipple at the same time. Lew groaned against Dick's hand. Dick had always been so damn good with his tongue. He pulled away, passing by the little finger, and started on the other hand. There was a new scar across the backs of Dick's knuckles, and it bothered Lew that he didn't know what it was from. He remembered Dick having a bandage wrapped around it briefly somewhere between Culoville and Carentan, but he didn't recall Dick ever saying why, and Lew hadn't asked. It was jagged and still an angry pink, and Lew kissed each knuckle in turn, resting his lips on the smallest knuckle and sucking lightly.

Dick had gone still below him, and almost seemed to be holding his breath. Lew ignored that and moved on to his wrists, They were mostly covered by the cloth, but Lew kissed a line down Dick's arm, starting at the pulse point on the inside of his right wrist. His skin was soft there, still vulnerable, and Lew didn't know how to deal with the idea that it might be cut or damaged. So far, Dick had kept his wrists smooth and safe. Lew wished he could believe that would last.

When he got to the inside of Dick's elbow, he held his open mouth to it and sucked. He bit down lightly on the red mark that made, and Dick whimpered against his chest. Lew drew back; it had left a purple mark that would last for days, but not in any place anyone but Dick would see. (Dick had once sucked a line of marks down his neck once, and Lew had had to invent a girlfriend to explain them.) Dick clenched his hands into fists, and his whole arm rippled under Lew's mouth. Lew switched to the other arm. It was safe and smooth as well, though the back of Dick's forearm was scraped from pushing through those damn Norman hedge rows. Lew kissed the scrapes, tasting iron, and kissed Dick's vaccination scar for good measure.

He was next to Dick's face by then, so he stopped to kiss him on the mouth as well. Dick lifted his head and pushed up against Lew, taking the kiss open mouthed and eager. He lifted his hips again, rubbing his cock against Lew's thigh, and grunted in disappointment when Lew not only broke the kiss but shuffled back down Dick's thighs.

"None of that," Lew said when Dick yanked at his bonds and leaned up to try to find Lew again.

"No?" Dick asked. He tried to buck his hips hard enough to pitch Lew off, but he didn't have the leverage. Instead Lew got treated to a show of Dick straining and writhing under him, mouth fixed in stern concentration. His skin was flushing pink, like it always did when he was turned on, and he gleamed with perspiration.

Lew waited until Dick gave up and went still, and then leaned in again and licked his collarbone, tasting salt. Dick kissed his hair, and Lew moved down to where his raised arms exposed the span of his ribs. Dick had always been lean, but the shitty food in Normandy and weeks on end of stress and combat and more stress had shaved a few pounds off of him. He couldn't really afford to lose them, and Lew hoped that his host family was as invested as feeding Dick up as he was.

Dick's shoulder was still bruised from the recoil from his M1, the marks of having fired it over and over again deep and purple on his flesh. Lew brushed the pad of his thumb over the place. He had no such mark, barely even bothered to carry a rifle, and had never fired one in earnest. Again, Dick hesitated under him, holding his breath as if he expected Lew to pass judgement, but Lew just leaned back down and kissed that place too. He skimmed his hands down Dick's ribs until the his thumbs framed the bottom of his diaphragm. He had the same tan as Dick did, and the backs of his hands were a dark contrast to Dick's chest. He knew that Dick didn't have especially sensitive nipples, but he leaned down and kissed them anyway, a brief and familiar peck on each one, which made Dick laugh and try for kissing his hair again. He missed this time, and Lew shuffled further down his legs.

The really sensitive place—which Lew had found after extensive research into the topic—was the the skin just below Dick's hipbones, above the join between stomach and leg. He rubbed his cheek along first one side then the other, letting his stubble scratch along Dick's skin. Dick lifted his hips again, and Lew didn't know if he was trying to press against him or buck him off. When he smoothed the same places with his tongue, it was definitely pressing against. Lew licked the whole line again, and sucked at the point of Dick's hip until he left a mark there, too, bright purple and red against creamy skin.

Dick's stomach rose and fell as his breath sped up, and he squirmed under Lew. His cock was straining up, trying to find contact, which only reminded Lew of how hard he was already. He rubbed his cock against the crease between Dick's thighs, but it wasn't nearly enough pressure. Well, if he was making Dick wait, it was only fair that Lew had to as well.

Lew got off the bed. Dick jerked angrily against the ties, making the bed frame creak, and muttered, "For Pete's sake, Nix," in a tone that indicated that he wasn't going to put up with this a hell of a lot longer. Lew wanted to make him wait, just to show him he could, but Dick was blinded and tied down, and the trust between them didn't feel like enough to play a game like that, not now. He knelt by the bed and stroked down the side of Dick's hip until he got to the curve of his ass and pushed his and under so he could squeeze. Dick spread his legs and lifted his hips to give Lew room to do what he wanted. He clearly liked this track a lot better than Lew getting off the bed. Lew reached just far enough to brush Dick's hole with his fingertips, and the briskly ran his hand down the back of Dick's thigh. Dick sighed pointedly.

"Hush," Lew said. "I'm working." He'd always loved Dick's legs. They were a little scrawny maybe, but he knew the strength in those thigh muscles, how he could chew through the distance on a morning run, and leap up an eight-foot wall on the obstacle course. Lew had spent far too much time watching them during PT, and staring at the back of them on runs up Currahee. Since Benning he'd known what they felt like wrapped around his waist, Dick's heels digging into Lew's back as he dragged himself onto Lew's cock like he wanted to meld them into one person. Lew ran the flat of his palm up and down Dick's thighs, letting the hair tickle his hands. He kissed the top of his knee, scraped the inside of Dick's knee with his stubble, and then kissed it better again. Dick groaned, and rolled his hips just for the feel of trying to do something.

But when Lew started to move lower, Dick sucked in a sharp breath and tried to flinch away. Lew caught his calf firmly and held it in place. It was Dick's bad ankle, where he'd caught the ricochet in Carentan. The wound didn't have a bandage on it any more, but it hadn't completely healed either. It was angry and red because Dick hadn't been able to stay off the fucking leg and didn't look like he was going to start any time soon, so even weeks later it made an ugly, misshapen twist in his smooth skin. Lew studied it. He hadn't had sex with Dick while he'd had his boots off since before D-Day, and Dick hadn't been willing to show him before now.

He didn't seem that willing at the moment, either, and kept trying to pull out of Lew's grip. Lew wondered why. Dick was proud as a rooster, but not usually about his looks, at least when they didn't pertain to hygiene or deportment, so Lew didn't think that was it. He said, "It doesn't look like going to scar too badly, anyway."

"I thought you were helping me relax," Dick said waspishly, so Lew gave it up. He kissed Dick's calf above the wound and his ankle below it and then trailed his hands over his feet before he got back on the bed.

"You worried I only love you for your looks?" he asked once he was kneeling between Dick's spread legs.

He didn't know why that made Dick angry, but he twitched and looked away, even behind the blindfold, turning his head to press his face against the inside of his arm. Lew knew that it hadn't been a true hit, or Dick would have snapped back, but he was at the edge of the truth. Something to do with what he thought of Dick, or what Dick that Lew thought, anyway.

"I don't care," he said. "You could lose the whole damn leg, and I wouldn't care."

"I don't want to hear it, Lew," Dick snapped, so Lew shut up. Dick thanked him by bending his knees and lifting his ass up, showing Lew exactly where he wanted him to touch next.

Lew licked his lips, and leaned over to the bedside table again. He fished out a bottle of KY and a condom and put them on the bed. Then he waited for a moment, enjoying the view of Dick's body spread out before him, how his hips kept lifting and his hard cock jutted up. Lew touched the tip with his thumb, and Dick hissed in a breath. He couldn't see Lew's touches coming, and was also surprised when Lew patted his knee and when he stroked the skin high on the inside of his thigh. Lew laughed, delighted at the new game, and Dick growled at him, but he didn't sound unhappy any more. All he wanted was to make Dick feel good. He scooted back on the bed far enough that he could put his face between Dick's legs and breathe out a long slow breath up the length of his cock. Dick twitched, then visible braced himself, thighs flexing against Lew's cheek. Whatever he'd prepared for, it wasn't Lew pressing his nose against the base of Dick's cock and then licking up from his asshole to his balls and back down again.

The bed frame creaked and shook as Dick yanked down again, but it was solid English oak and didn't give. "Dammit" Dick muttered, and Lew grinned. He circled Dick's hole with the tip of his tongue, coating the rim with spit, and then sat up enough to push a fingertip in. It didn't go far, more rubbed the spit into his entrance than penetrated him. Dick dug his heels into the mattress and spread his legs wider. He was breathing hard and fast already, sweat shining his limbs. It made Lew want to start touching him all over again, but he wasn't quite that cruel. Also, he had a raging hard on, and he needed to be inside Dick.

He poured a splash of lube over Dick's balls, letting it drip down the path his tongue had just taken until it reached Lew's fingers. He caught it with three fingers together, and circled them around Dick's hole, spreading the slick over his hands and pushing it bit by bit inside Dick. He dripped more lube into the palm of his hand—ready to tip down when he needed to—and set the bottle aside. Dick's breath kept hitching in anticipation as Lew held his finger tips against his hole and waited. He gripped Dick's thigh lightly, but he didn't need to hold him steady. Dick wanted to open up for him; he would have taken Lew if he'd fucked into him then and there, and would hardly have whimpered at the stretch. That wasn't the game Lew was playing though. He slid two fingers in up to the first knuckle and pumped them back and forth, a quarter inch at at time.

"Oh," Dick moaned, like he'd never been touched like this before. Maybe he'd forgotten what this felt like, though his body hadn't. Lew hardly needed to stretch him, he felt so ready. He pushed in deeper anyway and spread his fingers.There was no resistance at all, only a slow, smooth finger fuck as Lew pushed his fingers in and out and in and out. He spread them wide and then curled them into a knot, and spread them again. Tipping his hand let more lube trickle inside Dick, and moving was even easier then. "Oh, oh, oh," Dick kept saying. He had his face pressed into his arm again, and his lip caught between his teeth, but he'd stopped pulling against the headboard.

Lew let go of Dick's thigh and closed his hand around Dick's cock, but Dick shook his head and said, "No, I won't... I won't last. I want..."

"You want me inside you when you come?" Lew asked, and he considered playing that game out too, the one where he made Dick ask for exactly what he wanted—in as explicit terms as Dick could stand—before Lew would do it, but that felt like too much. Dick was already stretched thin, and Lew didn't want to snap him. Me just wanted to rattle him a bit, shake him free of his singular focus.

Dick nodded, a little jerk of his head, and Lew did as he asked. He had to use his teeth to get the cardboard condom wrapper open and the band undone with just one free hand. (It was a skill Lew had put a lot of time into.) His head was starting to spin a little from how hard he was, and he couldn't help sighing at the feel of the condom rolling on. Dick always insisted on the damn things, because they were neater, he said, and Lew couldn't say he minded this part, anyway. Dick moaned when Lew pulled his hand out and lifted his hips again, holding himself wide open and ready for Lew.

"God," Lew whispered, as much at the sight in front of him as the feel of running his slicked hand up and down his cock a couple of times. He took Dick's hips so he didn't have to hold his weight up the whole time and lined up the tip of his cock to his hole. He didn't want to be too much of a tease, but still had to stop and admire Dick's body as again he tugged at the bonds. His muscles flexed and his skin pulled tight across his sides, and it all looked too good to be true. It didn't seem real that they'd made it through all that and were back here in England, safe, at least for a little while.

"Okay," Lew said, and pulled himself together and pushed in. Dick felt perfect around him, just like he always had. He was still tight, but not enough to burn. Lew paused once the head of his cock was inside, but Dick wasn't breathing any harder than he had been, and didn't show any signs of suppressed pain. (Lew had learned long since that Dick wasn't good at telling him to slow down if something hurt.) He rocked forward, squeezing Dick's ass to pull it up to a better angle. By the time his balls brushed Dick's ass, and he was settled in right to the root, Lew felt dizzy with the intensity of Dick's muscles squeezing around him. Dick kept lifting his hips and flexing his legs, and Lew knew he was doing it on purpose to put pressure around Lew's cock. "God," he said again. "You feel so damn good. I have no idea how I survived without this. I needed to touch you."

Dick just shook his head, unable to answer. He squeezed down on Lew's cock, making the drag as Lew pulled out again even sweeter.

"You have no idea how many times I thought about this," Lew told him. He pushed back in, a little faster this time, and had to stop talking because the feel of Dick around him made it hard to breathe. Heat built inside him, but he didn't want it to be over yet. He stopped, trying to pull himself back together. "It's stupid, but I didn't even worry about you that first drop, not even when we didn't find you for eight hours. If anything happened to you, I knew I'd know. I'd feel it." It was the dumbest thing he'd ever said, because Lew didn't even believe in God, let alone any of that Victorian novel claptrap, but he really had believed it at the time. Coming down in the flak and the darkness, he'd held on to two things: that Dick Winters was capable of surviving anything, and that Lew would know if he didn't. Dick kept his face turned away, but he whimpered as if Lew had hurt him, as if he were going to cry. "So I just kept thinking about what I'd do to you when I saw you again," Lew said. He'd distracted himself enough to keep a steady pace now. "I had plans just to strip you out of your ODs and fuck you against a tree or something, but we never got the chance."

"Lew," Dick said, but he didn't have it in him to finish. Instead he wrapped his legs around Lew's back. It dropped more weight against Lew's grip on his ass, but it also changed the angle enough for Dick to moan and thrash his head back and forth each time Lew thrust.

"I wanted to touch you, all the time," Lew told him. "I had fucking filthy thoughts about you. When General Bradley was pinning that D.S.C. on your chest, I thought about sucking you off right there in the middle of the field. You could have bent me over that stage they set up." He'd had to stay longer than anyone because of the hard on he'd given himself, but that had been worth it too, since Dick had walked him back to town, and their hands had touched. When they'd gotten there, Lew had indeed shoved Dick into his billet and sucked him off, but it had been a hurried thing, and Dick hadn't had time to reciprocate with more than a hand job. (It had felt like Toccoa all over again.) Now, Dick's thighs clamped around his hips and their sweat-slicked skins slid against each other as Lew snapped his hips in short, jerky thrusts.

Dick still wasn't talking, but his body shook under Lew's hands, and he held his head still again, his mouth open and gasping. His arms twisted and pulled against the ties, but Lew thought he was seeking sensation as much as trying to escape. His fingers closed around Lew's belt and gripped it until his knuckles turned white. 

Lew could hear his heartbeat pounding in his ears, and the rush of blood shimmered across his skin, making his hair stand on end and the room feel close and too hot. The sound of their breathing filled the air, and Lew squeezed his eyes shut. He couldn't look at Dick any more; it made his chest ache in a way that he couldn't put words to. They were both sightless then, knowing only the sensation of their bodies coming together.

Lew let go of Dick's hip and stroked up his cock in one slow drag of skin on skin. Dick arched his back and came without a sound. He stopped breathing, his body caught in a spasm of pleasure, and the whole world seemed to pause in the second between when he started to come and when his cock spurted across his chest.

The added pressure of his muscles clamping down on Lew's cock tipped Lew over too, and they tumbled together. Lew realised he was saying Dick's name mingled with a steam of profanity without knowing he was speaking, and bit his lip to make himself shut up. He was always too open around Dick, gave too much of himself away. Lew would give him everything, if only Dick asked, but he never did.

Dick was kind though, and indulgent, and he kissed Lew's hair when Lew dropped his forehead against Dick's chest. Lew waited a minute, taking long slow lungfuls of air until he could hold it together, then he looked up. Dick's lips were still pressed against Lew's hair, so they bumped noses before they kissed. Dick hummed happily, those little pleased sounds that Lew seemed to spend his life trying to pry out of him.

"I think I like this game," Dick said when he finished kissing Lew. He rubbed his face against the inside of his arm until the blindfold rolled up and off one eye. He blinked against the light and the focused on Lew. "How are you?"

The wave of euphoria was still rolling through Lew's system enough for him to say that he felt fantastic and not even be lying. He smiled down at Dick and pulled the blindfold the rest of the way off, then smoothed Dick's hair back down. "Jesus, I love you," he said. It wasn't the first time he'd said it, but it was the first time since D-Day, and for a second he felt terribly afraid that Dick's answer would have changed. It hadn't.

"Yeah, you too, Nix," Dick told him, and the soppy smile that went with it made the words mean a thousand times more than they did on the surface.

Lew kissed him again, and then started to untangle their bodies. It went pretty well until Lew realised that he hadn't been paying that much attention when he'd tied the scarf, and all of Dick's yarding on it had set the knots. Some sailor he was.

"I could cut it," Lew suggested as he picked at the silk. He couldn't even tell which part belonged to which knot.

"You can cut _your_ map!" Dick snapped. He was pushing his wrists together to get more slack, and looking up at Lew with a mixture of consternation and amusement.

"I could cut this one and give you mine," Lew suggested, but Dick had set his jaw and clearly wasn't going to give any ground on this one. Lew unbuckled the belt so that at least Dick could sit up and hold his hands in front of him.

"Didn't really think this through, did you?"

"It was a spur of the moment sort of plan," Lew admitted. "Worth it though, huh?"

Dick made a face, so Lew kissed him, and for a moment their lips locked together, and Dick's bound hands spread out across Lew's ribs. Then Lew pulled away and started in on the knots again. It was easier with the belt slack, but he still had to pick at each clump of fabric until it loosened, and then move onto the next, working the knot free bit by bit.

"It was worth it," Dick said after watching Lew for a while. "Thank you, Lew."

"Any time," Lew said, smiling. "Like I said, I missed you."

"You hardly left my side," Dick said, but Lew could tell he knew was meant.

"Where else would I be?" Lew asked. The first knot came free and he ditched the belt and rubbed around Dick's wrist to ease the faint red mark. Dick let him pick at the one on his right wrist instead of trying to do it himself, which Lew took as a sign of good will.

Dick shook his head, and Lew didn't know if that meant he thought the answer was obvious, or if he didn't think there was another answer. Where indeed would Lew be but at Dick's side? Lew wondered which one of them was Watson and which one Holmes in their odd little dynamic duo, or maybe it was Abbot and Costello.

"How's your leg?" he asked, glancing down at Dick's ankle. He had it crossed with the other one, and it didn't look so bad from this far away, just a pink stain, like a birthmark.

"Still hurts," Dick said. "Doc says I should rest it up more, but I don't know when I'll have time. I can't afford to be injured, not right now." Not ever, his tone implied. It wasn't ugliness that he hadn't wanted Lew to see earlier, it was weakness and failure, Dick's shame at allowing himself to be wounded when his men needed him.

"You're really starting field exercises tomorrow?" Lew asked. He'd thought Dick would give the men at least another week, but apparently not.

"I need to get on those replacements," Dick said. "Their training is worth crap. If they come under fire in this shape, they'll all be killed in minutes, and get the veterans killed along with them." Dick sounded like he believed that, so Lew let it lie. He knew that Dick could train those men round the clock for however many months they had between now and the next drop, and his boys would still get killed, replacement or not, and Dick would still blame himself.

"Don't forget to take a break every once and a while. It's lonely up in Battalion." Lew finally got the second knot undone, and rubbed Dick's right wrist like he had the left. He looked again at the scared knuckles and wondered when and how that had happened. Dick had such beautiful hands.

Dick saw him looking, but didn't explain. Instead, he cupped the side of Lew's face with that hand and kissed him as tenderly and tentatively as he had that very first time, like he could believe that Lew was really there and wasn't running away. Lew knew the feeling, and wondered if it showed on his face to the same extent. 

"I'm glad we're back," Lew said.

"Yes," Dick agreed, "so am I."


End file.
